Australian Belly Tank

[gearheadeh]

Just got word yesterday that there'll be a few more cars going from Australia...one of our faves....

Wayne Pickles' HK Monaro "Marilyn" it ran 217 last year.


217 in an old classic looking lump like that.... they are doing a great job of converting hydrocarbons to noise!

[Seldom Seen Slim]

What's the surface in these photos?  It sure isn't Bonneville salt -- it's way too white and nice-looking.

We'll look forward to seeing all of you at SpeedWeek.

[penny]

Lake Gairdner      D.L.R.A Speedweek 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oieQi_637ow

[Dr Goggles]

Went to make a start on the parts scrounge for the little tank project yesterday.

After going back to Bill's to get the right key I headed down to one of his "other" yards..
http://maps.google.com.au/maps?q=75+Knight+avenue+North+Sunshine&oe=utf-8&rls=org.mozilla:en-US:official&client=firefox-a&um=1&ie=UTF-8&hq=&hnear=75+Knight+Ave,+Sunshine+North+VIC+3020&gl=au&ei=vru8TcDxOoz8vQPEpIzZBQ&sa=X&oi=geocode_result&ct=title&resnum=1&ved=0CBcQ8gEwAA

Now, this is a dirty part of the world....on the corner of Knight st I notice someone has piled building materials ten feet high for two acres, not landfill per se, more land-stack.......down the street is a Tallow works....anyway in the satellite shot if you can see cars jammed close together, they're probably Bill's......

There are plants , I am sure that only grow in wrecking yards....right next to the little Oxford I was hoping to remove the rear axle from was the original bush that they made the crown of thorns from....it looked as dead as a doornail, but it could not be bent , or snapped off and it had evil inch and a half long spikes all over it....each time I walked past after stomping it or trying to cover it with something it would spring back ...there was a wet slippery patch right next to it ....meanwhile the smell of the dead cat at the gate hung in the very still air....I skun my knuckle on the very first nut I began to loosen.....

At this point I began to look for sensible reasons as to why this ( removing the rear axle)wasn't going to happen as opposed to the mixed up hoodoo ideas that today just wasn't my day,because the signs weren't good...the Oxford was sitting on top of a Renault 10...what the French knew about lightweight monocoque design  was never of interest to the men at Morris, this was plain to see by the way the weight of the Morry had collapsed the Renault to 2/3rds of it's original height , there is more steel in the roof panel of the Morris than the whole Renault body.....

By the time I got to removing the passengers side rear wheel I had my ticket, It was too close to the next car to take off....The way the Morris rocked, the smell ,the thorn bush I just knew if I persisted that there was a greater evil awaiting as soon as I started jacking this piece of finery up and trying to haul the axle out..... I packed up my tools and went back to Bill's...

"Na, I'll have the crane in there on Monday, I'll haul it out, drop it on your truck and you can bring back the remains"

Hmmm, now I am left with the unenviable choice.....the smell, the mud the thornbush and the teetering ton of rust and rot on the unstable Renault...or taking a rotten old Oxford on the tray and parking it the driveway to dismantle.

[grumm441]

Get him to put it on upside down
G

[Dr Goggles]

Get him to put it on upside down
G

of course.

Today I changed tack, the earthworks on the rear of the Spirit of Sunshine for the new diff need to begin. As the year progresses there is a gradual decline in the motivation to embark on the big jobs...I figured if it went on long enough we wouldn't start this job because there might be a risk it would not be finished in time. The car won't be going to the lake next year unless we finish the job because as of this afternoon there is no pumpkin left, I chopped it out.


I removed the axles, the brakes and backing plates as one piece and some of the braces that hold the rear floor. I moved the axle stands to a cross-member inside the rear superstructure and took off the pyramid brace for the chute mount. Then I cut the axle tubes just inside the rear legs that hold them. My idea is to have some tube machined as a sliding fit in the original Ford axle tubes and then the other end ( slightly smaller, the whole lot will slide back into the orig' tubes to fit it up))machined to be a hot fit in the ten bolt housing. At this point we haven't looked too closely as to whether there is any difference in the crown wheel line that might mean we have to  have axles made or change the arrangement of the rear superstructure because there isn't much room for the pumpkin to move far either way. We have 28 spline axles that would fit the original diff, we're hoping we can use this new centre with them....I'm still getting my head around what we have to measure and do with those measurements.....There will also be a difference in pinion height ...we only have two inches of tube in our tailshaft.

[grumm441]

Now you have some space, and a saw
Do you think you could cut a hole in that plate so you could get those exhaust link pipes out
G

[SPARKY]

  now that is committment!!!!!

[Milwaukee Midget]

now that is committment!!!!!

Or a reason to BE committed.

Nothing flinched when you cut out the pumpkin?

My idea is to have some tube machined as a sliding fit in the original Ford axle tubes and then the other end (slightly smaller, the whole lot will slide back into the orig' tubes to fit it up) machined to be a hot fit in the ten bolt housing.

Gosh, maybe I'm just lazy, but you have it torn down this far.  And what you have here is so simple in its design.  I've got to believe replacing to whole housing and re-fabricating the attachment points would be preferable to creating what will be, in the end, a 5 piece axle housing.

They say that there is more than one way to skin a cat, but it does raise the question, "What do you do with a skinned cat?".

My 2 cents - worth maybe half of that.

[Dr Goggles]

a reason to BE committed.

Nothing flinched when you cut out the pumpkin?
Gosh, maybe I'm just lazy, but you have it torn down this far.  And what you have here is so simple in its design.  I've got to believe replacing to whole housing and re-fabricating the attachment points would be preferable to creating what will be, in the end, a 5 piece axle housing.

No it all sat there pretty relaxed.

The car was built on a pretty tight jig and measured up pretty well. We want to keep the Ford axles tubes and I'm not so confident that I think we can nail it as accurately, that is the alignment of the axle tubes.

Worse case scenario we have to build another jig and start from scratch with another rear end housing. That's a little more money and work than it sounds... If this works the way I'm hoping it will have saved a lot of grief.

If it doesn't work we haven't gone in the wrong direction, the old diff had to be cut out, it has no useful hangers anymore so either way it was to be butchered......if we can pull it off this way we'll be at the salt next year ready to rock.

As for being committed , we could split some grammatical hairs here.

[Dr Goggles]

They say that there is more than one way to skin a cat, but it does raise the question, "What do you do with a skinned cat?".

Well, that depends what your assigned task is.....

I'm not sure whether the phrase "I'm f****** this cat , you're just holding it's head" has international acceptance or not.... .

Colonel?

[wobblywalrus]

Being a bike guy, I am having a hard time figgering out what you are doing.  The pumpkin is the differential, it seems.  That looked like one of the better parts on the tank.  What is happening to it?

[Dr Goggles]

We are changing the diff from a Borg warner 8&3/4 (2.77:1)to a GM 7&1/2 10 bolt diff.( ratios from 2.73:1 up) However we wish to use Ford axles. We are attempting to change the centre section of the third member.That will allow us to achieve both, it mighten't work, if it does it will save a lot of grief in the alignment and keeping things straight while welding stakes that is the primary reason for avoiding a wholesale swap out which from the outside would seem a lot easier, more practical and above all , sensible.

[grumm441]

We are changing the diff from a Borg warner 8&3/4 (2.77:1)to a GM 7&1/2 10 bolt diff.( ratios from 2.73:1 up) However we wish to use Ford axles. We are attempting to change the centre section of the third member.That will allow us to achieve both, it mighten't work, if it does it will save a lot of grief in the alignment and keeping things straight while welding stakes that is the primary reason for avoiding a wholesale swap out which from the outside would seem a lot easier, more practical and above all , sensible.

The alignment of the rear axles and pumpkin is not as critical in a car that does about 40 miles a year as it would be on a taxi or a daily driver. I think it will work with some custom bits made up so as it can bolt up. The plan is in my head and it's hard to transfer it to paper.
After seeing a guy I worked for modify a borg warner 8.75 to fit in a Datsun 240Z this should be easy.

WW.
Goggles is calling the bit in the middle, the actual differential part in the housing, the pumpkin.

As for who's f#*&^$# this cat...... That's a Sandrewism. I think he came up with that after the famous , "I shot it twice and it got up twice" incident.  He is also our , er major sponsor and owned the aforementioned 240Z with a 350 chev in it
Which reminds me
no, too tacky
G

Oh and I am coming to speed week and BUB. Just have to pick the rental car

[Stainless1]

Graham, Priceline.com make offer at the airport you are flying in to.  Bid low, depending on car size you need, you can always raise your bid 24 hours later.  Last car I got in San Francisco was a full size, $11 a day.  I usually bid for full, premium and luxury andnever raise my bid for the first week, then I go up a buck for a couple of days... and so on.  Where are you flying in to?